Smucker Makes Internal Changes Following Hostess Acquisition

It’s been a busy year for The J.M. Smucker Co. Less than two months after acquiring iconic CPG Hostess Brands, the Orrville, Ohio-based company announced a new strategic business area called Sweet Baked Snacks. 

As part of the restructuring, Dan O’Leary was named SVP and general manager of sweet baked snacks and pet. Pet brands under that umbrella include Milk-Bone, Meow Mix; the Sweet Baked Snacks group includes the Hostess and Voortman brands. Previously, O’Leary served as chief growth officer at Hostess Brands, Inc. and also held leadership roles at Tyson Foods, Kraft Foods and Mizkan America. 

Smucker is supporting its expanded family of brands with other organizational moves across strategic businesses overseen by general managers reporting to COO John Brase. 

Those general managers include the following individuals:

• Rob Ferguson, SVP and general manager, coffee and procurement, for brands including Folgers, Dunkin’ and Café Bustelo.
• Rebecca Scheidler SVP and general manager, frozen handheld and spreads, overseeing the area previously known as Consumer Foods, spanning Smucker’s, Uncrustables, Jif and Smucker’s brands.
• Tim Wayne, SVP, away from home and international. 

"We are excited to share this updated strategic business area structure and the leaders who will drive the continued momentum of our leading brands in these growing categories," said Mark Smucker, chair of the board, president and CEO. "With this newly created structure, we are better positioned to take advantage of synergies, which will allow us to leverage the best-in-class expertise we have in our organization around innovation, marketing, commercial activation and supply chain management."

Smucker continues to pursue its transformation initiative in other ways. The company shared that it will align strategy, finance, transformation and information services under CFO Tucker Marshall. He will lead a team that includes Bryan Hutson, SVP, information services, transformation and portfolio operations. 

"We will continue to advance the great work that has been done to establish our transformation vision and structure through this evolved organization, which will enable greater cohesion among leadership across the business," remarked Marshall. "In this next phase of our journey, we will further integrate Transformation with the broader strategy of the company while continuing to embed the vision across all planning processes."

Meanwhile, Amy Held, chief transformation officer; Joe Stanziano, SVP and general manager, coffee; and Gagnesh Gupta, SVP, procurement and commodities, will transition from the company. Smucker will report its second quarter results on Dec. 5.